By default the Component Builder shows the most common Joyo kanji components (ie, components which are themselves Joyo kanji, or which are used in at least 3 other Joyo kanji). Select an alternative set of components below.

Most common Joyo kanji componentsStandard radicals (and their variants)All components and radicals

The Joy o' Kanji Essays

Welcome to Joy o’ Kanji, which will enable you to discover the joy of kanji! Below you’ll find introductions to detailed essays covering every aspect of each Jōyō kanji. Through loads of sample sentences and images containing the character in question, the essays give you the real-world experience you need so you can master kanji. You can download the essays in PDF form. After reading them, you can play games and use flashcards to work with the vocabulary and sentences from the essay.

If a Joy o' Kanji essay is available for a kanji, you will see this badge next to it in search results.

You can also find all kanji with essays available using the special search keyword jokessay:true, and if you know the Joy o' Kanji ID (the number under the kanji in the display below), you can use the special keyword jok:1009.

Unfortunately that feature is not accessible here. Please contact support if you have any questions.

More info about Joy o' Kanji

Joy o' Kanji is a site for true kanji enthusiasts. The brainchild of professional writer and
Japanophile Eve Kushner, Joy o' Kanji provides detailed essays on the etymology, usage and quirks of the Jōyō
kanji.
Once every week or so Joy o' Kanji produces a new essay featuring a single kanji. Reading such an in-depth essay
is a fantastic way to cement a kanji fully in your mind. The name 'Joy o' Kanji' itself is a clever pun on 'Jōyō kanji'.

This page provides a synopsis of all 375 kanji that have so far been featured by Joy o' Kanji. Each section provides links to a kanji's details page on Kanshudo for more information, as well as the ability to purchase and download a full essay (), study the lesson content (), play entertaining study games (), or view the kanji's details on Kanshudo ().

Create Flashcards for the kanji to study with Kanshudo's spaced repetition flashcard
system

View your current Kanji Mastery level for each kanji, as well as a quick
summary of readings and meanings

Download the kanji with readings and meanings for study offline or in another flashcard program

Kanshudo also features synopses of Joy o' Kanji's 'radical notes', free essays on each
of the 214 standard radicals. To find out more visit our radicals page.
For more information on Joy o' Kanji, visit the Joy o' Kanji website ⇗.

Learn how the Japanese speak about the colors of the rainbow, as well as double rainbows and "fogbows." Find out where in Japan you can see rainbows, both real and artificial. And come to understand how rainbows have colored Japanese culture, from music and religion to Rainbow Day celebrations and LGBT parades, not to mention all the organizations named for rainbows.

Learn to talk about literal floods, saying things like "This river sometimes overflows after the snow melts" and "The river flooded a wide area." Also find out about figurative floods (e.g., a flood of colors or a flood of desires), learning how to say "Our everyday language is flooded with Western words." Discover when the Japanese use 氾濫 versus 洪水, another word for "flood."

Enter the city of pleasure! This essay covers everything about Osaka, including its name, history, cuisine (e.g., Kansai sushi), castle, and entertainment industry, as well as the Osakan's colorful personality, conversational style, accent, and dialect. Learn about the "Osaka Metropolis Plan" that terrified some people, and find out about often-used terms such as "Keihan" and "Hanshin.'

This essay will make you dotty about all things spotted! With 斑 we can describe everything from polka-dotted species (including humans, with their birthmarks and freckles!) to rocks (e.g., those that the Japanese use in barbecues). The same character means "unevenness," and the essay shows how these disparate meanings connect. Great photos and fun quizzes!

See what a Buddhist priest and a mollusk have to do with kneecaps. Also learn what role the knee plays with regard to intimacy, romance, negotiations, protection, influence, respect, and sudden emotion or comprehension. Find out why the Japanese would go down on one or both knees, even sliding forward on the knees instead of walking, and why rakugo performers hide their knees.

Learn how the Japanese talk about leaning on elbows, standing with arms akimbo, hitting the funny bone, and elbowing someone in the ribs. Find out about massaging the elbows versus massaging with the elbows. See what an "elbow gun" might be and what it means to pull someone's elbow figuratively. Also learn words for the elbows on dogs, clothes, and even buildings!

Find out how to say “The news of his sudden death astounded me” and “I heard that my friend’s father had died.” Learn about a politician who died the very day he was elected, inspiring this photo caption: “Supporters suffer deeply at the news of the death of Noboru Tanigawa.” Also find out about the marketing potential inherent in death, at least as reflected on Amazon Japan.

Find out why Gifu Prefecture is considered the center of Japan and has been crucial as a crossroads. Learn about Gifu products, from paper umbrellas and lanterns to swords, plus UNESCO heritage sites and a well-preserved town on the Nakasendo. Also read about cormorants that catch and regurgitate fish for the imperial family to eat, a practice that inspired a famous artist.

See how jade disks connect with a term for “perfect,” and read the fascinating history of a hunk of ore that inspired the word. Learn to avoid a kanji error that native speakers commonly make when they write about perfection! Find out how to talk about perfection and perfectionism, as well as about people who excel at something equally and who therefore tend to become rivals.

After reading this essay, you'll know how to do all of this: talk about looking down on others, express contempt, accuse men of sexist thinking, and say that you despise someone. You'll also understand why a famous thinker thought Japan should bid good riddance to the rest of Asia, why the nobles viewed samurai as savages, and how a word for "scorn" relates to a carpentry technique.

The Kanshudo kanji usefulness rating shows you how useful a kanji is for you to learn.

has a Kanshudo usefulness of , which means it is among the most useful kanji in Japanese.

is one of the 138 kana characters, denoted with a usefulness rating of K. The kana are the most useful characters in Japanese, and we recommend you thoroughly learn all kana before progressing to kanji.

All kanji in our system are rated from 1-8, where 1 is the most useful.
The 2136 Jōyō kanji have usefulness levels from 1 to 5, and are denoted with badges like this: